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Excellent Introduction to the History of Israel for the Lay Person
I started reading Mark S. Smith’s Memoirs of God this past week. Smith states in the introduction to the book that his audience is those outside of “fellow scholars” and “graduate students,” i.e. “the general public.” For the whole of the book, I’m not so sure he hits that target. I work with a more…
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Brueggemann on Metanarrative
This will be the last installment of me posting excerpts from An Unsettling God: The Heart of the Hebrew Bible. Overall it was a good read (as well as a quick one), though I enjoyed the first part of the book more than the latter. I think his analysis of YHWH as a partner in…
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A Nice Bit of Satire to Start Your Friday Morning
I’ve been watching this whole Daniel Wallace thing expand into a full fledged controversy over the last couple of days. And, Doug Chaplin has a nice bit of satire on the matter today. I would love to cite the post in full, but I also want you to click over to Doug’s blog. So, here’s…
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Brueggemann Quote on the Wisdom Traditions
I am still reading through Brueggeman’s An Unsettling God: The Heart of the Hebrew Bible. I will probably finish tomorrow, but I’ve been posting some quotes from the book I have thought noteworthy along the way (see HERE and HERE). I may post a more substantial review if I have the time (doubtful with thesis…
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Free Course on the New Testament
I’m way behind on getting this one out there but here is a link to a free New Testament course from Yale University. Saw it on the Biblical Studies Carnival for this month. Now, you can study both the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible and the New Testament through Yale University, though no credit of course. You…
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Updating BibleWorks 8 on My Mac
I have been running BibleWorks 8 on my Mac for a couple of weeks now using Parallels. My time has been a bit sparse on account of SBL; however, I have noted previously that the functionality of BibleWorks 8 on my Mac using Parallels is excellent – the issues being the added cost of Parallels…
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Chris Brady and Introspection
Chris Brady’s most recent post entitled “Jesus Christ is Unavailable for Comment” provides a good model for how to be an introspective person. He takes a story first cited by Jim West about someone who in the opinion of many may be certifiably insane and uses the story as an opportunity for self-reflection. The story…
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"From the Depths of Sheol I Cry"
Some of you may recognize that line from Jonah 2.3. But, it is my honest state of affairs this morning. My 22 month old daughter has a stomach virus, which kicked in about 10PM last night. Enough said about that, I’m sure you can imagine. But at any rate, for those of you that I…
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Brueggemann on the Canonizing Process
Have continued reading Brueggeman’s An Unsettling God: The Heart of the Hebrew Bible this afternoon. Since I didn’t get a great deal of Brueggemann in seminary I didn’t realize how quotable he is. Some of this may be old hat to some of my readers, but I liked this little gem from chapter 2 (sorry,…
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Trying to Ask the Right Questions at Advent
After reading the Old Testament lectionary readings so far in the season of Advent, I realize how difficult it is to ask the right kinds of questions. For my entire life, I have lived within traditions that have treated prophecy primarily as prediction, at least at the popular level. The tendency is to think “Wow!…